Sakuya Time
by Yuuki F
Summary: The dirty truth behind Sakuya's time and space manipulation. One-shot.


Patchouli knocked on Remilia's office door, "Remi? Are you in?"

Remilia put down her paperwork, "Oh? Patchy? What are you doing here?"

Patchouli closed the door behind her and took a seat on the nearby couch, "It's about Sakuya."

"Oh?"

"I think it's important to know how she manipulates time and space."

Remilia sighed, "We've tried asking her, she apparently doesn't want to tell us, she's worked well for us so far with no bad intentions, and I sense no ill will from here. Can't we just leave it be?"

Patchouli shook her head, "It is not so simple. An ability that powerful and she sticks to being a maid? Even though she is only human, I feel it does not begin to explain the potential gravity of the situation."

"From my experience in centuries of social persuasions...I don't see anything potentially dangerous about her."

"It might be important to know the extent of the abilities of your subordinates."

Remilia couldn't argue with that. Not only that, but she knew Patchouli's personality well enough to know why she was really doing this.

She sighed, "Alright, I know you Patch, you want to go into explanation-mode."

A rare spark shone in Patchouli's eyes.

"I have three theories.

One: Sakuya can influence local gravity wells. Meaning she is able to 'bend' space, and at most extremely slow down or speed up current time. Her ability to 'bend' space may actually be quite limited.

Two: Sakuya can simply and only **stop** time at her will. Her ability to manipulate space comes as a result of a trick by moving within closed space.

Three: Sakuya can travel through time. She can go backwards, forwards, or stop it completely. Her ability to manipulate space comes as a consequence of this."

"Patche, this is all very interesting, but...great. We already know that Sakuya can manipulate time. Once again I must ask, why do we need to concern ourselves with the details of it so much when she does not even seem willing to tell us?"

Patchouli's eye glimmered as she placed her palms on the desk in a dramatic Ace Attorney-like pose, "That's just the thing. The consequences are actually important to all three theories. Because each theory influences where Sakuya may actually **come** from, and depending on where she **comes from** she may actually be working under ulterior motives."

She cleared her throat and continued, "In the second case, this implies that Sakuya has access to a closed space. Meaning that her true identity, way of life, and real intentions come from within the closed space. In the third case, she might come from the far future, working back here to prevent some calamity or who-knows-what; or from the distant past, working under the pretenses of some ancient deity. Only in the first case can I see no possible room for an ulterior agent.

Remilia sighed, "I hate to repeat myself. But she's worked so diligently for me for so long. The power of charisma means incredible empathy Patchy, and I sense nothing hostile about her."

Patchouli raised a hand, "Hear me out."

There was a knock on the door, and the two froze.

Remilia called out, "Come in."

Sakuya opened the door carrying a platter and nodded, "Tea, mistress."

Patchouli decided to leave the matter for another day, "Oh, that would be-"

But Remilia decided to cut straight to the heart of the matter, she asked bluntly, "Sakuya, for the sake of the defense of the manor, we must know...what are the extent of your time manipulation abilities?"

Sakuya almost shifted her gaze, "Mistress, you have already seen the extent to my abilities."

Patchouli interrupted, "Can you go to the past?"

Sakuya tried to hide her body language, but it was clear she felt trapped, "...Yes."

Remilia finally got why Patchouli was so insistent on pinning down Sakuya's powers, "You mean, Sakuya, you could go into the future and find out everything about tomorrow and report to us now in the present?"

Sakuya was getting a headache, "Well, yes and no?"

Patchouli gave her an inquisitive look, "What do you mean?"

"It's just," Sakuya sighed while shifting her gaze, "Don't laugh, alright?"

Remilia and Patchouli gave puzzled looks at each other, and then looked back at Sakuya and nodded.

Sakuya bowed her head, "It just gets way too confusing! You have your past self and your future self in different time planes, and you don't know if your future-future self is going to do something you yet don't know about that you have to place implements in order to avoid doing whatever your future self might do. Then you have to keep track of which dimension which one is in. And when you **do** cause a paradox, it's a real mess just to even **figure out** what you did! Let alone fix it!"

Sakuya's elegant posture began faltering slightly, "And most often it's the most mundane things, like you accidentally misplaced a flower that a future or past you or someone who your future or past you manipulated to pick that flower. Often I'm stuck in time loops misplacing every speck of dust to figure out what went wrong!"

She rolled her eyes, "And don't get me started about the entire 'win the lottery' scheme! That **never** works out without some ridiculous paradox getting in the way! Well, it has worked once or twice, but it's always such a pain. And when you fail, you never know, 'Was that a **real** paradox? Or was that a paradox that a future me concocted to get me to act in that way?' Most days I have to spend what feels like an eternity doublechecking my earlier movements just to make sure I can get through the day!"

By now her posture had deteriorated completely, she was in full-on rant mode, "And don't get me started about birthdays and anniversaries! They're hard enough to remember when you're **not** a time traveller! And things get **really** confusing when you start having cross-dimensional travel going on! I'm not even originally **from **this dimension!"

Remilia continued to stare at Sakuya's ramblethon, and offered her a seat.

"Thanks," Sakuya did not care about formalities anymore as she nonchalantly slide the platter on a nearby table, "And you wouldn't believe all the nonsense I have to do to get around ridiculous time paradoxes. Usually it involves some cockamamie scheme involving coördination between three of my alternate dimensional selves across several time planes just to get Keine to believe me so I can use her ability! Often times, however, it's just enough to have you help me Mistress: fate-fixing is incredibly useful when you're trying to stabilize parts of the time-space continuum. You've saved the universe more times than you can imagine! But you probably don't remember it because it always seems to cause some crazy paradox down the road and I have to go back and fix everything even more subtly."

By now, she had her legs crossed and was openly slouching in the chair, she just didn't care anymore, "Besides, I might as well tell you this now, because that crazy guy in the blue box showed up, and I **hate** it when he shows up. Which probably means I'm going to have to bend over backwards to solve something or other."

She sighed very heavily, "AGAIN."

She breached tea etiquette and grabbed the teapot of her own accord to pour herself some tea, which she uncharacteristically and noisily sipped, "You know, the blue-box guy says he has nothing to do with it, but I'm sure he has something to do with those stupid irritating 'EX-TER-MIN-ATE' boxes. I mean, they're no big problem, even Cirno can deal with them, but they are irritating! Lady Flandre has some affinity with them, which can be trouble, as she has allied with **them** on occasion."

She huffed again, "And -Box he keeps going on calling me 'fellow time lord' and all that nonsense. It really is incredibly irritating."

Sakuya could feel relief rising from her chest after saying all of this, "So, a year or so ago, about a year after I moved into this manor, I decided, 'No more unnecessary time travel! It's just too confusing!' Even though I do quite a bit of time travel that ends up being 'necessary' anyways!"

There was a slight pause as Sakuya noted what she just did. She got up and corrected her posture and elegance, "Sorry, Mistress."

Remilia had to keep from laughing.

Sakuya glowered.

Remilia composed herself, "Sorry, Sakuya, but...why didn't you just tell us, instead of keeping the extent of your abilities a secret?"

Sakuya looked away, "Aside from the possibility of paradoxes...mainly because everyone I've met in the past tries to get me along with some 'save my dead grandfather' or 'help me win the lottery' scheme, and I just...don't want to do that anymore."

Remilia sighed and smiled, "Oh, Sakuya..."

Patchouli, however, had had a concerned expression on her face the entire time, "There's just one thing that's off, Sakuya."

Sakuya blinked, "Oh?"

"You said, 'a year or so ago, about a year after I moved into this manor'," Patchouli paused, "You've been here for far more than two years already."

A look of horror fell over Sakuya's face.


End file.
